Hotel magnate Barron Hilton, 80, will donate 97% of his $2.3bn fortune to the Conrad N Hilton Foundation, set up by his father.
Reports have said that Mr Hilton is embarrassed by the behavior of his granddaughter.
Andrew Carnegie’s writings in “Wealth” come to mind.
Well Mr Hilton, we are embarrassed as Americans…as a species really.
This is ridiculous, by which I mean hilarious. Go Gorby, Go Gorby Go.
Four hours of the Truman story. A remarkable life to say the least. From the farm to the Presidency, not unlike Carter.
I’m still surprised that Truman ranks among the top presidents (as rated by historians).
One of the most pernicious allegations made against the African-American people was that our slave ancestors were either exceptionally “docile” or “content and loyal,” thus explaining their purported failure to rebel extensively. Some even compare enslaved Americans to their brothers and sisters in Brazil, Cuba, Suriname and Haiti, the last of whom defeated the most powerful army in the world, Napoleon’s army, becoming the first slaves in history to successfully strike a blow for their own freedom.
As the historian Herbert Aptheker informs us in American Negro Slave Revolts, no one put this dishonest, nakedly pro-slavery argument more baldly than the Harvard historian James Schouler in 1882, who attributed this spurious conclusion to ” ‘the innate patience, docility, and child-like simplicity of the negro’ ” who, he felt, was an ” ‘imitator and non-moralist,’ ” learning ” ‘deceit and libertinism with facility,’ ” being ” ‘easily intimidated, incapable of deep plots’ “; in short, Negroes were ” ‘a black servile race, sensuous, stupid, brutish, obedient to the whip, children in imagination.’ ”
While Napoleon Bonaparte waged war across the continent in the early 19th century, European satirists living in countries threatened by his encroachments represented his progress in a flood of caricatures.
These prints, published in French-occupied Germany in 1813, depict a parade of ragged French soldiers. Some are mounted on sorry-looking horses, some are missing limbs, and most lack shoes and lean heavily on canes. Any semblance of military uniformity has dropped away, as the men appear swathed in rags and tatters.
After Napoleon’s ill-fated attempt to wage war on Russia in the summer of 1812, his army of half a million men suffered greatly—first from the heat, as the Russians withdrew inland and dragged the invading army along, and later from the winter snow and cold, as they retreated, pursued by the Russian forces. As Joe Knight wrote for Slate last year, the army was also plagued by lice, and large numbers of men died of typhus carried by the insects.
This documentary is worth a watch.
A cursory glance at the comments section makes it clear that this battle between modernists and traditionalists is alive and well.
Assignment:
1. Read the Wiki page on the film. Get a general background.
2. Read these two reviews, one from 1940 when the film was released and one from 1972. (3 pages)
Come to class prepared to watch the film.
We will complete this sheet when watching the film.
Consider reading this short essay on “Humor and the Holocaust”.
Then consider that Chaplin said that he wouldn’t have made the film if he knew about the Holocaust.